Hosted by Students Against Israeli Apartheid – a working group of OPIRG-Toronto

Trish Salah is a Montreal-based writer, activist and teacher at Concordia’s Simone de Beauvoir Institute. She has been politically active organizing around a wide range of issues, including Palestinian solidarity, sex workers' rights, anti-racism and anti-capitalism, employment security and healthcare for transsexual and transgender people. Her first book of poetry, Wanting in Arabic, was published by TSAR Books and her recent writing appears in the journals Open Letter, No More Potlucks, and Aufgabe. Her new manuscript is titled “Lyric Sexology.”

Try taking some of that "Lyric Sexology" to the Islamic University of Gaza, Trish. See how far it gets you. (As for that bit about her teaching at Concordia's Simone de Beauvoir Institute--priceless!)

Update: Trish mentions that her poetry was published by TSAR Books. Sounds kind of Russian, no? In fact, it's fully Canadian. Fully multiculti-drank-the-purple-Kool-Aid-loony-lefty Canadian. According to its website, TSAR is "dedicated to bringing to the reading public fresh new writing from Canada and across the world that reflects the diversity of our rapidly globalizing world, particularly in Canada and the United States. Our focus is on works that can loosely be termed "multicultural" and particularly those that pertain to Asia and Africa." Aside from Trish, two of its other authors are Sheema Khan, CAIR-CAN founder and occasional opiner in the Globe and Mail (her upcoming book of essays is called, fittingly, Of Hockey and Hijabs), and Ehab Lotayef, whose book To Love a Palestinian Woman will be launced at Toronto's Beit Zatoun House in April.

The TSAR site includes this testimonial from Canadian Literature: "TSAR is changing our understanding of the Canadian literary landscape through its innovative publications."

You can say that again. And--well, whadya know?--the federal and provincial governments apparently support such, er, "change" since the Canada Council for the Arts, the Ontario Arts Council and the Ontario Media Development Corporation are listed as financial backers.

...Their strict observance might sound extreme, but the Islamic University is no fringe institution: It’s the top university in Gaza. The majority of students here study secular topics; not all of them are even religious. If you want to get a degree in Gaza, a territory that is home to more than a million people, it’s simply the best place to go.

At the same time, the university is something else again: the brain trust and engine room of Hamas, the Islamist movement that governs Gaza and has been a standard-bearer in the renaissance of radical Islamist militant politics across the Middle East. Thinkers here generate the big ideas that have driven Hamas to power; they have written treatises on Islamic governance, warfare, and justice that serve as the blueprints for the movement’s political and militant platforms. And the university’s goal is even more radical and ambitious than that of Hamas itself, an organization devoted primarily to war against Israel and the pursuit of political power. Its mission is to Islamicize society at every level, with a focus on Gaza but aspirations to influence the entire Islamic world.

In recent decades, as Islamism has grown from a set of isolated radical movements to a fully realized political philosophy, its powerful fusion of intellect, pragmatism, and fundamentalist faith has refashioned societies from the Gulf to Turkey, Egypt to Pakistan. For outsiders who want to understand its power and appeal, the Islamic University of Gaza is probably the best place to begin...

I thought everyone in Gaza is supposed to be suffering horribly due to Israel's prolonged "seige". The students shown in the photos look awfully well-fed for starving people.

I love the Internet--the sheer serendipitousness of it. You get on the ride in one location and, a few clicks later, end up somewhere completely different--and totally unexpected. Today, for instance, I got on at Islam Online, where I read this piece about Ireland's P.M. sucking up to Muslims. That took me to the Irish Times, a paper I must admit I'd never read before. It was there I found this, a fascinating piece about a young Irishman named John Burke. Back in the 1980s, Burke reverted to Islam and ran off to join the jihad in Afghanistan, where he died a martyr's death. Fast forward to Ireland, 2010, and his ever lovin' dad is still mourning his loss--and still trying to figure out why his son did what he did:

...John’s death was recounted in a typically overblown obituary published in Al Jihad, an Arabic language magazine published by Arab fighters then based in Peshawar. “The Muslims of the European continent offered a martyr to start a new page of the history of such a glorious jihad,” it reads beneath a photograph of the Clonmel man looking sombre with a luxuriant beard and turban. “He carried his weapon to take part with his brothers in the battle of conquest . . . he was shot in his heart and, God willing, martyred. Muhammad Omar, who did not marry although he was 27 years old, met his Lord while pleasing Him . . . Glory be to He who guided him to Islam and jihad and granted him martyrdom. Let him enjoy it.”

John’s father received many letters from those who had known his son in Pakistan and Afghanistan. One, from a mullah named Fazal U Rahman, hailed him as “our great mujahid”. He continued: “We, as Muslims, believe Muhammad Omar has followed the path of truth and courage against those who disobey their creator – Allah.”

Two months after John was killed, his father received a letter from the Department of Foreign Affairs containing his son’s passport, an identity card he used in Karachi, and some documents, including his will. The Burke family had inquired about the possibility of repatriating his remains from Afghanistan but Ireland’s honorary consul warned that this would be “extremely difficult” for a number of reasons.

“As he was fighting against the Afghan authorities no assistance will be forthcoming from the Afghan government,” the letter reads. “Your son is buried in an area controlled by Muslim extremists who may not, under their religious law, allow the exhumation of remains . . . In addition . . . there would be major transportation problems involved.”

A letter from one of John’s associates in Pakistan put it differently: “He lies buried where he wanted to be . . . it does not seem proper and advisable to get his body back to Ireland because it would be against his wishes and irritating for his blessed soul.”

More than two decades have passed since the day John Burke answered a knock on the door at his home in Clonmel only to be told his son had been killed fighting in Afghanistan. “It was very hard,” he recalls. “My only hope was to see if I could get his body home. I wrote to everyone I could think of to see if they could help. The Red Cross eventually found out where he was buried out in the desert but there are still questions over whether it is his actual burial place. Other people have said he was buried in a cemetery somewhere.“We still don’t know how he was killed, whether it was a shooting incident or whether he was killed when he stepped on a mine.” Now and then, John takes out the file of yellowing letters sent by his son to puzzle yet again over why he chose that path. “It really shocked me. I never thought he had gone that far into it,” he says. When the attacks of September 11th, 2001 brought Afghanistan back into the headlines, the memories came flooding back, and John found himself wondering if his son had survived would he too be fighting with the Taliban. Sitting in the family’s livingroom, there are reminders all around of the young man who later became known as Muhammad Omar. Framed photographs hang next to landscape scenes painted by John junior. On a bookshelf stands a windmill he constructed out of matches. “It is still devastating to think about it even after all these years,” John says, shaking his head. “Sometimes I find myself talking to his photograph here in the room, asking him why did you do it . . . I just can’t find the answers.”

What a sad story. He could have run off and joined, say, the circus, or the French Foreign Legion. But since he signed up with the dudes who believe Allah's rules rule, he's lying dead and alone in some remote Islamic backwater, leaving behind a father, a shell of a man, with nothing more than his memories...and questions.

The "giant" who probably did the most to work up the planet into an advanced case of eco-frenzy has taken a break from counting the proceeds of his hugely profitable carbon credit operation to inform us, the little people (via the New York Times), that "We Can't Wish Away Climate Change".

Maybe not. But maybe, if we try really hard, we can wish away the Climate Change scammers who, despite the cooked data and far from "settled science," are still trying to pull off the biggest con in history--impoverishing the developed world in order to "save" the planet, i.e. environmental Marxism.

Displayed on the poster was an image of a Muslim woman wearing a hijab, accompanied by the words, "how can we liberate them?"

The poster was disturbing enough, but even more disturbing was the fact that it was distributed all over Amsterdam in 2003 as a government public service announcement.

Two persistent false images dominate the propaganda used by Islamophobes. One is that Muslim women are oppressed because of -- not in spite of -- the teachings of Islam.

The other is that Western imperial powers, particularly the United States, are genuinely interested in liberating Muslim women, especially following the American-led occupations of Afghanistan and Iraq.

In reality, these false images are not new at all; their roots date back to the European occupation of Muslim lands during the 1700s. Today they are so widespread thanks to Western media.

While Reformation-era Europe learned much from its Muslim neighbours (especially in sciences and medicine), it seems Western culture has a very short collective memory. Present-day media rarely refer to Islamic truths that paint a very different image from the depressing and confusing portrayals of women that readers are more likely to find in their pages.

Where can non-Muslims learn, for example, that in Islam women have souls; that they have equal intellectual capabilities as men; that they have as much right and need of advanced education in every field of human inquiry; that they can initiate divorce; keep their family names after marriage; or have separate and distinct careers in their own right?

Alongside the false imagery of missing information is the insidious media-hyped disinformation that Muslim men (especially “religious” ones) are sexist, oppressive wife-beaters.

You’d think that the media in our so-called “liberal” society would pay more attention to concrete issues that genuinely compromise and demean the quality of life of Western women, who are statistically at greatest risk from the effects of poverty, pornography, domestic abuse, marginalization, or lack of educational opportunities in career-building fields (like maths and sciences).

And you’d think that these same media would invest far more emphasis on the urgency of exposing human rights violations committed against Muslim women in Palestine, Bosnia, Iraq, Afghanistan or any other area in which war and civil unrest produce many more victims among non-combatants...

Yeah, what's up with that, media? What's with all the articles about "honour" killings and the abuse of domestics in Saudi Arabia and chicks (who according to the Koran are "fields" to be plowed at will by their hubands) being brutalized and punished in various sharia-ridden lands?What's that? There isn't much coverage of any of that and if you want to find it you'll have to do your own Internet search? Then what the heck is Elmo going on about?Why, it's almost as though he realizes Islam had a huge P.R. problem, chick-wise, and is doing his best to disguise it with lots of smoke.

It may be time to consider changing the name of Britiain's ruling party from "Labour" to "Hezbollah" (the "party of God"). The Telegraph reports that a buncha jihadis have apparently infiltrated it for Allah:

The Islamic Forum of Europe (IFE) — which believes in jihad and sharia law, and wants to turn Britain and Europe into an Islamic state — has placed sympathisers in elected office and claims, correctly, to be able to achieve “mass mobilisation” of voters.

Speaking to The Sunday Telegraph, Jim Fitzpatrick, the Environment Minister, said the IFE had become, in effect, a secret party within Labour and other political parties.

They are acting almost as an entryist organisation, placing people within the political parties, recruiting members to those political parties, trying to get individuals selected and elected so they can exercise political influence and power, whether it’s at local government level or national level,” he said.

“They are completely at odds with Labour’s programme, with our support for secularism.”

Mr Fitzpatrick, the MP for Poplar and Canning Town, said the IFE had infiltrated and “corrupted” his party in east London in the same way that the far-Left Militant Tendency did in the 1980s. Leaked Labour lists show a 110 per cent rise in party membership in one constituency in two years.

In a six-month investigation by this newspaper and Channel 4’s Dispatches, involving weeks of covert filming by the programme’s reporters:

IFE activists boasted to the undercover reporters that they had already “consolidated … a lot of influence and power” over Tower Hamlets, a London borough council with a £1 billion budget.

We have established that the group and its allies were awarded more than £10 million of taxpayers’ money, much of it from government funds designed to “prevent violent extremism”.

IFE leaders were recorded expressing opposition to democracy, support for sharia law or mocking black people. The IFE organised meetings with extremists, including Taliban allies, a man named by the US government as an “unindicted co-conspirator” in the 1993 World Trade Center bombing, and a man under investigation by the FBI for his links to the September 11 attacks.

Moderate Muslims in London told how the IFE and its allies were enforcing their hardline views on the rest of the local community, curbing behaviour they deemed “un-Islamic”...

I believe it was Joseph Stalin--or maybe the Prophet Mohammed--who said: "Give us an inch and we'll take the whole bleeping globe."

Saturday, February 27, 2010

Here's how it works in Canada: When the Liberals are in charge (the nation's default setting, at least as the Liberals see it) they appoint all sorts of folks who are mui simpatico with their worldview--and that's perfectly normal and perfectly okay. But when Conservatives manage to capture the reigns of power and appoint people who are in synch with their outlook, the Liberals have an absolute cow.

Case in point: the foofaraw over Rights and Democracy, an arm's length government outfit (and useless drain on the taxpayers) created by the Tories (so in a sense they have only themselves to blame for the current mess). When the Liberals were in office, the agency's Liberal appointees liked to dole our lots of moolah to Palestinian-supporting/Israel-reviling "human rights" outfits. In an attempt to put the kibosh on this outrageous practice, the Harper Tories appointed some of their own people to high positions at R&D. The fallout: the opposition is now basically having full-on apoplexy. The Toronto Star has the latest on the R&D tempest in a teapot(the details of which I won't go into, since they are immensely soporific)--Liberal leader Michael Ignatieff's 'profound' thoughts on the subject:

OTTAWA–Opposition leaders are rejecting the government's pick of a new president to head Montreal's troubled Rights and Democracy, calling him a partisan choice that risks further upsetting the agency.

In a letter rejecting the choice of Gérard Latulippe, Liberal Leader Michael Ignatieff accused the Conservatives of trying to hijack arm's-length government agencies.

"Your government has demonstrated time and again that it aims to impose on our country's independent institutions the most extreme views espoused within your own political party," Ignatieff wrote.

"And when this approach is applied to an independent organization dedicated to the promotion of human rights and democracy, it is particularly offensive."

Foreign Affairs Minister Lawrence Cannon's pick of Latulippe was ostensibly meant to bring stability to the government-funded agency, which has been rocked by questions of funding, a revolt by staff against the Conservative-appointed board, and the suspension of senior employees.

But Latulippe's past political ties have only fed opposition suspicions that the government is trying to engineer a takeover at the independent rights agency, which has an $11 million budget to foster democracy and human rights around the globe.

Latulippe, currently the resident director for the National Democratic Institute in Haiti, was a one-time candidate for the defunct Canadian Alliance.

Latulippe was also an adviser to Stockwell Day when the Treasury Board president was Canadian Alliance leader.

He also served alongside Cannon when they were Quebec Liberal MNAs in the 1980s.

Ignatieff notes that Latulippe's resumé circulated to the opposition leaders seemed to omit the more partisan points of his career...

Zzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzz. Oh, sorry. I seem to have nodded off there for a second. While I was sleeping, though, I dreamt up the perfect solution for the R&D situation. To wit: get rid of it. I promise you not a single taxpayer who's not on the payroll will even know it's gone.

David Frum notices that York U has turned into festering cesspit o' Zionhass:

Next week, York University will once again open its halls and classrooms to “Israel Apartheid Week,” so-called. This year as every year, militants and activists will use the taxpayer-funded facilities of York to vilify the Jewish state.

Well, that’s free speech, isn’t? Everybody gets to express his or her point of view, no matter how obnoxious, right?

No, not right. Not at York. At York, speech is free — better than free, subsidized — for anti-Israel haters. But for those who would defend Israel, York sets very different rules.

In advance of York’s annual hate-Israel week, the campus group Christians United for Israel applied to use university space to host a program of pro-Israel speakers.

The university replied that this program could only proceed on certain conditions.

It insisted on heavy security, including both campus and Toronto police — all of those costs to be paid by the program organizers. The organizers would also have to provide an advance list of all program attendees and advance summaries of all the speeches. No advertising for the program would be permitted — not on the York campus, not on any of the other campuses participating by remote video.

These are radically different and much harsher terms than anything required from the hate-Israel program. The hate-Israel program is not required to pay for its own security. It is free to advertise. Its speakers are not pre-screened by the university.

The pro-Israel event, scheduled for this past Monday, Feb. 22, was cancelled when the organizers declined to comply with the terms. A university spokesman told the Jewish Tribune that it insisted on the more stringent requirements on pro-Israel groups “due to the participation of individuals who they claim invite the animus of anti-Israel campus agitators.”

The logic is impressively brazen: Since the anti-Israel people might use violence, the speech of the pro-Israel people must be limited. On the other hand, since the pro-Israel people do not use violence, the speech of the anti-Israel people can proceed without restraint.

Over the past days, however, the university appears to have realized that this “We brake for bullies” policy on speech might present some PR problems.

So now it seems they have reverted to a bolder policy: flat-out denial...

Hey, don't knock denial. As a policy employed by multiculti mush-brains, it has had a long and garlanded history. Morever, you can’t really fault York University authorities for defending the “free speech” of Israel-loathers while doing diddly to protect the freedom of Israel-defenders. After all, the loathers have shown themselves to be loud, unruly and really quite scary. The defenders, on the other hand, are apt to barricade themselves in classrooms in an effort to evade the rambunctious, “free-speaking” mob--i.e. not scary in the least.

I believe it was Karl Marx--or maybe Yasser Arafat--who once observed: “The squeaky wheel gets the grease.” How right he was, as, alas, we see craven York U officials, covered in the oily effluvium of the loathers' Zionhass, unable to get a grip.

In our ongoing fight against racism and discrimination, CAF has put together a survey to examine the prevalence of hate crimes and other forms of discrimination and ways in which we can counter these forces together.

immediately above the link to the CAF's most recent Weekly Bulletin. Click on it and the first thing you'll see is a promo for the annual fiesta of campus Zionhass, "Israeli Apartheid Week," which begins anew on Monday.

In an irony the nuances of which obvioiusly escapes them, these Arabs, who proclaim their devotion to "the fight against racism and discrimination," are delighted to purvey the most prevalent--and the most pernicious--hatred of our time.

The big question: Was Desiree Rogers pushed, prodded or pointed to the exit door at the White House?

Answer: Yes.

"She is loved by the Obamas and part of the Chicago White House gang, but it became apparent Desiree was totally in over her head in her role as White House social secretary," a top Dem source said.

"Desiree was under-prepared and broke the cardinal rules of the job: Keep your head down, work your ass off and do not permit the camera to focus on you," added the source, who is familiar with the inner workings of the White House.

"She was the wrong pick in the first place," the source said.

In the aftermath of the White House "Gate-crasher" scandal and the elevated status in which Rogers clothed her "Comme des Garcons" self, she became an unwanted distraction -- and it was emanating from first lady Michelle Obama's East Wing.

Rogers claims the "Gate-crasher" incident wasn't the deciding factor in her resignation, but the White House felt she had to go...

was the national finance director for the presidential campaign of the Barack Obama. Under Smoot's direction, the campaign raised $32.5 million during the second quarter of 2007...Smoot was born in North Carolina. She graduated from Smith College in 1989. Smoot served as finance director for then Senate Democratic leader Tom Daschle and as finance director for Senator John Edwards's Senate race in 1998.

SAN DIEGO - Anger boiled over on the University of California San Diego campus Friday, where students took over the chancellor's office for several hours to protest the hanging of a noose in a campus library.

Students wearing red handkerchiefs over their faces blocked the doors to Chancellor Marye Anne Fox's offices for hours, while more students inside chanted "Real pain, real change."

They left the office peacefully at sundown, about the same time that leaders of the university's Black Student Union ended talks with administrators in a nearby conference room over demands that include more boosting the African-American curriculum and campus activities. A university spokesman, Jeff Gattas, said there were no arrests and no property was damaged during the takeover.

The noose found dangling from a light fixture on the seventh floor of Geisel Library on Thursday night was the latest in a string of racially charged incidents in the university community, authorities said Friday. Less than two weeks ago, an off-campus party mocking Black History Month ignited racial tensions.

A University of California statement said a student admitted she and two other people were responsible. The statement did not identify the students or their race or include a motive.

In a news conference Friday afternoon, Fox said the student has been suspended but declined to discuss her motive or other students involved.

"This person admitted her involvement in what we consider to be an abhorrent act," said Fox.

Hundreds of students rallied for several hours outside the university administration building Friday, where speakers denounced the noose as an example of intolerance on a campus where less than 2 percent of students are black.

UC and campus authorities did not indicate whether the students would be charged with a hate crime. Under state law, hanging a noose to terrorize is punishable by up to a year in jail.

"Whatever the intent of the authors of this act, it was a despicable expression of racial hatred, and we are outraged," the UC statement said. "It has no place in civilized society, and it will not be tolerated."

To blacks, a noose recalls the days of widespread racism and lynchings.

"How am I supposed to walk into that building? How am I ever going to be safe there?" said ethnic studies major Cheyenne Stevens, who is black.

Mustafa Shahryar, 21, said he had seen the noose as he left the library.

Shahryar, who is from Afghanistan, told the crowd he grew accustomed to racial slurs while growing up in Southern California but was stunned to see the noose.

"Nothing phased me until last night," he said. "I just took that noose as an attack on all of us."...

The sight of a noose (hey, I believe Mustafa saw it; don't you?) and everyone goes into mass freak out mode? These people are in serious need of some heavy duty chill pills. Barring that, a cold shower followed by the application of some baby oil, so such silliness'll just roll off their backs, should do the trick.

...Da boy is Mahmoud al-Mabhouh, a leading Hamas operative who habitually boasted of killing two Israeli soldiers and was renowned as an arms supplier for various Palestinian groups in Gaza.

He who lives by the Kalashnikov tends to die by the Kalashnikov.

It’s a tragedy that violence still occurs in the world, but it would be equally tragic if we singled out one nation for condemnation.

There is a very good chance that some branch of Israeli intelligence killed the man.

The Mossad is often mentioned, but historically the people who carry out the frontline acts, the “wet jobs” as they’re known in such circles, are agents of the internal security service, what is generally known as Shin Bet but is more properly called Shabak.

Beyond this is the Kidon or Bayonet unit, an inner group within Mossad.

Whatever and whomever, it is predictable but still deplorable that Israel is considered so pernicious when it eliminates its sworn enemies abroad, but the United States, various European countries and certainly numerous Arab regimes escape censure.

Mahmoud al-Mabhouh had dedicated his life to killing Israelis and wiping Israel from the face of the map.

Did we seriously expect the Israeli government to send him flowers and chocolates and a cream-cheese bagel just for luck?..

One of the most mind-boggling aspects of our "human rights" system, for me, anyway, is the fact that so many lawyers are so supportive of it. One would have thought that those who have been trained in Western jurisprudence--Lady Justice, blindfolded, holding balanced scales and all that--might look askance at our "parallel" system in which the woman has pulled off her eye covering, is sporting garish make up, and has a hard time walking because she's wearing high heels and her scales are hugely out of whack: Lady Justice as a slut. Doesn't participating in such a pathetic charade of justice make lawyers feel, well, kind of dirty? Appararently not, as testified to (pun intended) by this letter in the National Post. It was written by the attorney who represented the delicate blossom who claimed she was forced to endure "racial slurs" at her place of employment (which wasn't a genteel flower shop but a rough and tumble trucking firm). For her "pain and suffering," she was compensated by the Ontario 'roos to the tune of 25 thousand smackeroos:

Re: Employers Vs. HRCs, letter to the editor, Feb. 23.

Contrary to letter-writer Sheryl P. Lipton's assertion that, in human rights cases, "recognized legal tenets such as witnesses and documentation are unnecessary minutia," a hearing before the Human Rights Tribunal of Ontario is a formal legal proceeding, in most respects no different than a trial in a court, and one that most certainly requires evidence.

In the case of Cheryl Khan (who was awarded $25,000 in compensation for enduring racial slurs in workplace) the hearing took place over five days, documentary evidence was presented and testimony was heard from 10 witnesses. In his 37-page decision, the vice-chair determined the employer's witnesses were "inconsistent, troublesome" and "attempting to hide aspects of [his] behaviour."

In contrast, the testimony of Ms. Khan and her witnesses was "clear and unproblematic."

Ms. Khan had to prove her case, and she did.

Bruce Best, counsel for Cheryl Khan, Toronto.

Of course the 'roos found her witnesses "clear and unproblematic". That's how the system is set up--to see the complainant (generally speaking, a member of one of Canada's designated "victim" groups) as being in the right and the defendent (more often than not a white guy, a small business owner) as being "troublesome" and in the wrong--especially if it reaches the 'roo stage, because had the defendant submitted to shakedown much earlier on, he would have obviated the need for a 'trial'.

Since Mr. Best doesn't seem to be the least bit abashed to have participated in this joke of a trial, this tawdry simulacrum of justice, please allow me to be embarrassed on his behalf.

Friday, February 26, 2010

ABC News reports that "White House Social Secretary Desiree Rogers is stepping down from her position just 14 months into her tenure as the Obama administration staffer responsible for opening up the White House and shaping the Obama brand" (my emphasis).

Mark Steyn and Hugh Hewitt have a good chuckle at the expense of Congresswoman Louise Slaughter, who tried to make the case for Obamacare at the "health care summit" by recounting the hard luck story of one of her constituents:

HH: Now I do have to play for you one more clip. This is what I call the chopper stopper. It’s not Obama, but it signifies a great deal. It’s Congresswoman Louise Slaughter, cut number 7:

LS: I even had one constituent, you will not believe this, and I know you won’t, but it’s true. Her sister died, this poor woman had no dentures. She wore her dead sister’s teeth.

MS: I’m in favor of that. If we can’t at least, if we can’t reduce our carbon footprint, at least we should be able to reduce our mastication mouth print by recycling dentures. I mean, this gets to the heart of why this is...is second-hand dentures, which I believe was the fourth chorus of that Barbra Streisand song, for those with long memories, but is second-hand dentures a huge problem in the United States? What are the number of people going around? There’s 300 million people here. Are 20 million going around with second-hand dentures? Are 5 million going around with second-hand dentures? The idea that you need comprehensive national health care for, to solve this particular lady’s second-hand denture crisis, I think is…

The exchange inspired me to revise the Barbra Streisand song in question: If the Congresswoman thinks things are bad now, recycling-wise, wait till Obamacare kicks in:

I'm wearing second hand teeth,A second hand leg.That's why they call me'Second Hand Peg'.Even the pacemaker in my tickerWas 'harvested' from someone so much sicker.Second hand bits;I'm good to go if it fits.If I get something new it's very rare.Even though Pelosi and H. Reid think it's swellI can't say Socialism's really going so well. Change in the air now that the system is fairThanks to Obamacare.Thanks to Obamacare.

Some of us kafirs don't much cotton to the idea of Islamic law setting up shop here in the West. For the purposes of marginalizing those who balk at sharia, Islamists have coined the useful term "Islamophobia". Dr. Zijad Delic, the imam who serves as "the CIC's executive director in Ottawa," uses the smear to great effect in his latest peroration, a "definition" of "Islamophobia. From the way "Dr." Delic uses the disease model to explain what he insists is a kind of psychopathology, you would think he's a real medical doctor. In fact, he's a "Dr." by virtue of his having written a doctoral thesis on the topic of, get this, the "tasks and activities relevant to building bridges between the Canadian Muslim community and mainstream Canadian society, in hopes of creating more cohesive cooperation among all Canadians." And what better way to create "cohesion" than to persuade us that we, miserable "Islamophobes," are the bad guys for trying to keep sharia at bay:

...Despite the existence of Canada’s renowned Charter of Rights and Freedoms, along with the considerable contributions made by Canadian Muslims to promote fair integration, they continue to experience various forms of alienation, discrimination, harassment and sometimes violence, all of which are rooted in negative stereotypical portrayals of Islam and its adherents - thus the irrational phenomenon that has come to be known as "Islamophobia."

As a result of the cancerous spread of Islamophobic attitudes, the past decade has seen Canadian Muslims become a collective soft target for negative societal discourse - a trend widely evidenced by the media, as well as in the stance of certain influential politicians, social commentators and academics. And where members of the general public are concerned it seems that more and more people - with or without background knowledge and valid evidence - have become self-appointed experts on the "Others" in their midst. In fact, one would have to live in complete technological isolation not to be aware of the ongoing debate, discussion, and idle chatter about Islam and Muslims.

These ubiquitous depictions and speculations (most of them, unfortunately, negative) have created an atmosphere of ambivalence and misunderstanding which only serves to feed the spreading toxin of Islamophobia...

Nuh uh, Doc. What spreads "Islamophobia" is the awareness that sharia law is a clear and present danger to Western civilization. Sharia is the problem. "Islamophobia" is, if not necessarily the solution, then the prerequisite for the solution (which would entail keeping sharia in its own part of the world and preventing it from bleeding over into our Dar).

One of the most striking features of the Mohammed crisis that has plagued the Danish and international communities since 2005, is a lack of dialogue.

The parties have repeatedly reacted – and over-reacted – without studying what others felt, or the background to their behavior.

Our predominant view throughout the lengthy debate has been that much could have been avoided if the government of the time had chosen to handle the crisis differently and added an element of dialogue and diplomacy.

It is in this light, that today’s small contribution to dialogue in this unfortunate case should be seen.

We have not found it too difficult to accept that our re-print of Kurt Westergaard’s caricature of the Prophet Mohammed has seemed offensive to many Muslims.

It has never been our intention to offend anyone. The cartoon is legal under Danish law. And we have only printed the cartoon in connection with our news coverage.

But that does not change the fact that our re-print in February 2008 was perceived as part of a renewed affront and provocation that once again caused tempers to fly in large parts of the world.

Tired of the case

Thanks to this acknowledgement and regret, we have reached agreement with a large group of Muslims from eight different countries.

The accord is an agreement designed to look forward, focus on de-escalating tensions and with hopes for further reconciliation between Denmark and the Muslim world.

At the same time it has naturally been vital that Politiken in no way, as a result of an accord, has placed any form of restriction on its editorial freedoms.

What we choose to publish, including which cartoons we choose to print, will continue to be our sovereign and free decision...

That's what you think, Politiken. Don't you know that, as far as the "Muslim world" is concerned, you're only "sovereign" until you submit (and it sounds to me that that's exactly what you've done)? No matter how much "jaw jaw" you engage in with the affronted, the aggrieved and the over-the-top angry, under the terms of sharia, Islam's "universal" law, you cannot--I repeat, cannot--be a "sovereign" dhimmi.

As for your show of bravado about publishing whatever you want--bravado is all it is since it's unlikely you'd jeopordize your newfound amity with Muslims by knowingly publishing something that would upset them.

A leading Danish newspaper was today accused of betraying the freedom of the press after breaking ranks with its rivals to offer an apology to Muslims for publishing a cartoon depicting the prophet Muhammad with a bomb-shaped turban.

Politiken issued the apology after settling with a Saudi lawyer representing eight Muslim groups that complained after the cartoon was reprinted by 11 Danish papers in solidarity with the cartoonist Kurt Westergaard, who received death threats last year.

Outrage at the move was led by Denmark’s Prime Minister and by Mr Westergaard, 74, who survived an alleged assassination attempt by an Islamic axeman at his home last month.

Politiken responded that it was apologising for the offence caused, not the decision to publish, in an attempt to reduce tensions with the Muslim world...

The nation readies itself for the spectacle of Obama’s special exercise in showmanship and partisan bi-partisanship, offering Republicans and the American people once last chance to sign on to the Democratic plan to take health care out of the hands of us plebs and hand it over to a caring, sharing government.

Any moment now, we will be treated to the President of the United States lecturing us about how he is going to improve health care by making it worse, how he is going to save money by spending $1 trillion dollars, how he is going to make the delivery of health care more efficient by turning it over to a government bureaucracy.

Does anyone — anyone — really believe him? Does he believe himself?

I do not know.

What I do know is that we’ve been down this road before. And one person who saw what socialized medicine was all about was Ronald Reagan. I’ve quoted from this magnificent speech before. Let me quote from it again: “One of the traditional methods of imposing statism or socialism on a people,” Reagan observed, “has been by way of medicine. It’s very easy to disguise a medical program as a humanitarian project.”

Ask Americans whether they want socialized medicine: the invariable answer is no. As Reagan notes, Truman tried it. He failed. But just present socialism as a liberal project and you can get people to roll over, wave their arms and legs in the air, and empty their wallets...

Obama has told Israel (you know, the Jewish state that finds itself in the crosshairs of genocidaires in the grip of a Messianic fever) that "crippling" sanctions against Iran are out of the question: Mr. Outreach thinks such sactions will "punish" the Iranian people, and he only wants to "punish" their leaders. Well, maybe not "punish" them so much as blow them lots of kisses and hope that his preternatural charm can melt their cold, cold hearts.

BENGHAZI, Libya (Reuters) - Libyan leader Muammar Gaddafi called on Thursday for a "jihad" or armed struggle against Switzerland, saying it was an infidel state that was destroying mosques.

"Any Muslim in any part of the world who works with Switzerland is an apostate, is against (the Prophet) Mohammad, God and the Koran," Gaddafi said during a meeting in the eastern Libyan city of Benghazi to mark the Prophet's birthday.

"The masses of Muslims must go to all airports in the Islamic world and prevent any Swiss plane landing, to all harbors and prevent any Swiss ships docking, inspect all shops and markets to stop any Swiss goods being sold," Gaddafi said.

Can you perhaps tell us how that jihad business of yours works, oh Waxen One? We're a bit confused about the details:

"Let us fight against Switzerland, Zionism and foreign aggression," said Gaddafi, adding that "this is not terrorism," in contrast with the work of al Qaeda which he called a "kind of crime and a psychological disease."

"There is a big difference between terrorism and jihad which is a right to armed struggle," he said.

Good to know, Botox breath. And, why, exactly, do you have such strong feelings about boring old Switzerland of all places? (One is reminded of Orson Welles's diss in the movie The Third Man: "Like the fella says, in Italy for 30 years under the Borgias they had warfare, terror, murder, and bloodshed, but they produced Michelangelo, Leonardo da Vinci, and the Renaissance. In Switzerland they had brotherly love - they had 500 years of democracy and peace, and what did that produce? The cuckoo clock.")

Gaddafi accused Switzerland of being an "infidel, obscene state which is destroying mosques," in reference to a Swiss referendum verdict barring construction of minarets.

He called for a "jihad against it with all means."

Gaddafi was speaking before leading prayers in a Benghazi square in the presence of envoys from dozens of Muslim countries.

Uh oh. You're in big trouble now, Switzerland. You can kiss that neutrality shtick of yours g'bye. Looks like this time around you don't get to sit out the world war.

Personal hygience products, pet food and stomach or rectal medications, eh? I didn't realize that might be a problem. But since it is, apparently, I'd love to see this douche's visage on kitty litter and suppositories.

If you were at a Second Cup last Friday afternoon and saw a chick reading Maclean's magazine who chortled, hooted and cackled over the course of several minutes, that was me, and I apologize for disturbing your peace. It's just that I was reading this, and, well, the fault is Steyn's, not mine, because he wrote the following:

Judging by emails from readers in America, Britain, India, Australia, Europe, Africa and beyond, Vancouver’s Olympic ceremony was a gold medal snoozeroo of politically correct braggadocio impressive even by Canadian standards. A Florida correspondent suggested that Beijing’s decision in 2008 to downplay discreetly its official state ideology might have been usefully emulated by Canadian organizers unable to go a minute and a half without reflexive invocations of their own state ideology of “diversity.” A reader in Sydney said he had no idea until the ceremony that the majority of Canada’s population were Aboriginal. Actually, if they were, you’d be hearing a lot less talk about “diversity,” for reasons we’ll come to later.

But don’t take the word of doubtless untypical Steyn readers. Out on the Internet, the Tweeting Twitterers pronounced it a bust, and even in the Toronto Star Richard Ouzounian declared that “the eyes of the world were upon us and we put them to sleep.” On the other hand, the Vancouver Sun’s reporter cooed that this was “the Canada we want the world to see, magical and beautiful, and talented.” This just after she’d written: “Maple leaves fell from the sky. And then, the divine poetess Joni Mitchell and her haunting Clouds fills the air while a young boy floats and soars above the audience, undulating fields of wheat below.” I was pleasantly relieved to discover that a story about “the world’s most lethal cocktail” concerned some enterprising dealers who’ve been lacing heroin with anthrax, and not whichever malevolent genius came up with the idea of having airborne ballet dancers doing interpretative choreography over the Prairies to a mélange of Both Sides Now and W. O. Mitchell’s Who Has Seen The Wind. As is traditional, most of the creativity went into the audience estimates: apparently, this tribute to the only G7 nation comprised solely of high priests of the Great Tree Spirit, armies of Inuit sculptors, and Cape Breton chorus lines of federal grant worshippers was watched by three billion people “worldwide.” As if the Royal Canadian Mint could afford to commission that many commemorative authentic pewter maple-encrusted manacles.

Canada’s message to the world: every cliché you’ve heard about our plonkingly insecure self-flattering PC earnestness has been triumphantly confirmed. You need pay us no further heed until the 2068 Commonwealth Games opening ceremony. Half the countries, twice as long!..

Do read the rest. It'll put a zing in your step, a grin on your face and make you feel at least as good as that "special" yogurt is supposed to make you feel.

The Human Rights Code represents fundamental principles upon which our society is based. The Tribunal plays an important role in ensuring that those rights have real meaning. To do this, we have developed processes designed to be accessible and understandable.

The community must have confidence that Tribunal staff and members will treat each party with respect and address each Application in a fair and timely manner. Applicants, respondents and intervenors have the opportunity to be heard in a process that is accessible, fair, and based on the law and jurisprudence.

What a bunch of tommyrot! The process is not fair--since it is set up to favour the complainant, whose legal bills it picks up--not timely--it can drag on for years which, as Erza Levant has pointed out, is part and parcel of how it punishes the defendent--not accessible, or at least, accessible only to some (i.e. minorities/members of designated victim groups; if you want to complain about, say, an imam's hateful statements you can forget about it), and not based on the kind of law and jurisprudence on which Western law is predicated (although it does bear more than a passing resemblance to Soviet and Islamic law).

If we can't get rid of this cockamamie kangaroo court outright, can we at least get it to be honest about what it does?

Although Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad ordered the increase of uranium enrichment to 20%—bringing Tehran much closer to weapons-grade nuclear material—China still opposes new United Nations sanctions. The responsibility for stopping the Iranian bomb thus rests with a "coalition of the willing." The attitude of Germany—Iran's most important Western trading partner—will be critical to the success of such a coalition. But while the recent announcement by Siemens and Munich Re to exit the Iranian market have garnered headlines, hundreds of German manufacturers remain determined to continue doing business as usual with Tehran.

Much of that business goes undetected via Dubai. Iran's Mullahs use the United Arab Emirates as a back door through which to funnel goods that cannot be brought in through the front door because of existing sanctions. The role of the German-Emirati Joint Council for Industry & Commerce, founded only last year, on May 20, raises serious questions about the German government's commitment to meaningful sanctions.

Karl-Theodor zu Guttenberg, the German economics minister at the time (who has since become defense minister), considered the Joint Council so important that he took time from his busy schedule to attend the founding festivities. Partly financed by German taxpayers, the council announced just a few months ago, on Nov. 5., the formation of an "Iran Working Group" to assess "how new trade and investment flows can be created—including [for] German companies—using the United Arab Emirates as a gateway to the Iranian market."...

Why would a wealthy, educated young Nigerian want to stick 'splosives down his pants and blow up a large American airliner full of people? That's the question that plagues--baffles, really--some of those who shared cabin space with Umar AbdulMutallab on that fateful December day. CNN interviewed some of them:

(CNN) -- The weeks have passed and, in most cases, their nerves have calmed. What began as shock, that they were almost victims of an in-flight terrorist attack, has morphed for many into contemplation. There are those who are still talking about what happened to them on Christmas Day, and there are others who are determined to put the incident behind them.

The passengers of Northwest Flight 253 may have been one faulty explosive away from disaster.

The suspect in that incident, Nigerian-born Umar Farouk AbdulMutallab, 23, pleaded not guilty in January to six federal terrorism charges. And he has been talking to authorities, thanks to help from his own family members.

But what if the passengers could be part of that conversation? What would they want to know or say to AbdulMutallab, the government, the world? CNN reached out by phone and e-mail to find out.

More than anything, if they could sit down with AbdulMutallab they would simply ask: Why? How did a young man who grew up with privilege, education and exposure to the greater world end up accused of attempting a terrorist attack?

"For me, these are the burning questions," said Roey Rosenblith, 27, who co-founded Village Energy, a company in Uganda that hopes to help bring solar electricity to the 80 percent of Africans who have no electrical power. "I've never had someone try to murder me, much less someone I didn't even know. So I'm very interested in finding out more about [his] motives so that we might possibly figure out how to avert others from traveling down the same path."

Could the fact that AbdulMutallab is talking to officials signal he has regret, Rosenblith wonders. If not, if he is a "lost cause," Rosenblith said he wouldn't care to waste breath speaking to him.

"I don't spend a lot of time seeking out conversations with Holocaust deniers, Islamic fundamentalists or religious fanatics of any stripe," he said. "I guess I've decided that people that are beyond the pale of reason are simply that and nothing I say will convince them otherwise."

Melinda Dennis, 31, was sitting about an arm's length from AbdulMutallab when he was taken up to first class after the incident. She stared at him, and his blank expression. Now she says she'd rather speak to others considering the path he is accused of taking.

"No matter what nationality we are or religion we choose, we are still people. I am a human being, a person that faces each day trying to make myself better and enrich the lives of people who know me," said Dennis, who's lived the past year-and-a-half in Rotterdam, Netherlands, where she works as a manufacturing project manager. "Whether I live or die should not be decided on the whim of a person that wishes to brand all Americans as evil people. I am not defined by my nationality, but I believe in the goodness that resides in the people of every country."...

Well, Roey, Melinda, I can explain why BombPants acted the way he did in a single line: Jihad is the way; sharia is the goal.That's all you need to know, really. And it's the reason why, Anne Frank-esque bromides about innate goodness to the contrary (let's not forget, Anne made her comment while she was hiding in the attic, not when she was dying of typhoid in Bergen-Belsen), young Muslims will continue to act out in this "baffling" manner until you Roey, and you Melinda and everyone who dwells in that portion of the world not yet squared away for Allah concedes that sharia is numero uno.

Wednesday, February 24, 2010

The Presbyterian Church is putting a new spin on an old hatred, writes Phyllis Chesler:

The Presbyterian Church in the United States (PCUSA) is about to release a report which denounces Israel as a “racist” nation which has absolutely no historical, covenantal, or theological right to the Holy Land. The report calls for the United States to withhold financial and military aid to Israel and for boycotts and sanctions against Israel. That’s not all. The report also endorses a Palestinian “right of return” and “apologizes to Palestinians for even conceding that Israel has a right to exist.” According to the press release, it also states that Israel’s history begins only with the Holocaust and that Israel is “a nation mistakenly created by Western powers at the expense of the Palestinian people to solve the ‘Jewish problem’.”

In addition, PCUSA has also resolved to divest in companies that supply military equipment to the American Army, e.g. Boeing, Lockheed-Martin, Northrop Grumman, Raytheon, etc.

In 2004, this Church became the first mainline Protestant denomination in America to “approve a policy of divestment from Israel.” This was rescinded, but in 2008 the Church “created a committee dominated by seven activists holding strong anti-Israel beliefs. The lone member sympathetic to Israel, quit in protest when he saw their radical agenda.”...

And in a related story, even though, no doubt, they are highly-trained professionals, DHS staff seem to have a hard time keeping tabs on their firearms:

Washington (CNN) -- Nearly 180 Department of Homeland Security weapons were lost -- some falling into the hands of criminals -- after officers left them in restrooms, vehicles and other public places, according to an inspector general report.

The officers, with Customs and Border Patrol and Immigration and Customs Enforcement, "did not always sufficiently safeguard their firearms and, as a result, lost a significant number of firearms" between fiscal year 2006 and fiscal year 2008, the report said.

In all, 243 firearms were lost in both agencies during that period, according to the January report from Inspector General Richard Skinner. Of those, 36 were lost because of circumstances beyond officers' control -- for instance, ICE lost a firearm during an assault on an officer. Another 28 were lost even though officers had stored them in lockboxes or safes.

But 74 percent, or 179 guns, were lost "because officers did not properly secure them," the report said...

Gee, the criminals who made off with DHS firearms seem to have a lot more on the ball than the security "experts". Maybe Janet should consider getting rid of some of her dead wood and hiring the crooks.

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Scaramouche is my nom de Web. My real name is Mindy G. Alter, and I like to think of myself as a free speecher with a sense of humour. My bailiwick: fighting on behalf of all the good things that free speech helps safeguard, and doing my utmost to highlight the malevolence and imbicilities of those who oppose freedom, whomever they may be.